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This article describes the preliminary findings in the Basque Country of a project shared by four European countries to teach a second language or a foreign language to preschool and school-age children. The method used to teach the foreign language – in this case, the third language (English) – is based on the use of dramatized formats (Taeschner, 1992). Here, we examine (1) the level of proficiency attained by the experimental groups (50 pupils) at the end of the first year and at the end of the second year of working with the method and (2) the level of proficiency attained by the experimental groups by the end of the second year compared to that attained by the control groups (20 pupils) working with a different method. Other variables are also considered: specific behavior types (disruptive, withdrawn), intelligence, sex, language achievement, and sociocultural background. The pupils were tested at the beginning of the project, at the end of the first year, and at the end of the second year. The linguistic data were transcribed and analyzed with the CLAN programs of CHILDES (MacWhinney, 1995), and various statistical analyses were carried out. The results indicate significant differences in language proficiency in favor of the experimental group as well as some interesting information about children with specific behaviors learning with this method.

THE beneficial effects obtained by hypophysectomy in the treatment of advanced cancer of the human breast have revived interest in the role of pituitary factors in the pathogenesis of mammary tumours (Coppedge and Segaloff, 1951;Segaloff, Gordon, Horwitt, Schlosser and Murison, 1951; Scowen and Hadfield, 1955; Hadfield, 1956a and b). Many years ago experimentalists produced evidence for a promoting influence of the adenohypophysis on the growth of mammary cancers in mice. Morphological descriptions of the pituitary in this condition remain scanty and to our knowledge no pattern has emerged which could be called typical for cancer of the breast. When we came into the possession of a high mammary cancer strain, the pituitaries of which showed gross abnormalities, it was hoped that a useful tool had become available for a reinvestigation of the role of pituitary hormones in the development of tumours of the breast. In the following an account will be given of the origin of this strain (NZY), of the endocrine abnormalities observed in the females and of the neoplasms occurring in animals of both sexes. METHODS AND MATERIALThe mice were kept in thermostatically controlled rooms at a temperature 70 ± 2°F. The composition of the stock diet as well as of the food given to the breeders has been described in a previous communication (Bielschowsky and Bielschowsky, 1956).At the age of 28 days the animals were separated from their mothers and the female offspring from the male. Some of the females were kept as virgins, the others, at the age of 8 weeks, were mated to their brothers with whom they remained until they had produced and reared 4-7 litters. However, when a breeder failed to become pregnant during a period of 3 months the animal was removed from the breeding box.Forty miales, 31 virgins and 84 breeders belonging to the 18th-24th generation were kept under observation during their full life span. They were killed when they appeared to be seriously ill or when palpable tumours were discovered. Some mice with mammary cancers were allowed to live for 5-8 weeks after the tumour was first observed. It was impossible to keep a constant number of animals per box but care was taken to avoid overcrowding. The maximum nunmber of mice at any one time never exceeded 15 in boxes measuring 28 x 43 X 13 cm.The material presented in this paper consists of the 155 mice mentioned above together with 43 healthy females and 6 males killed for a study of the endocrine glands and their target organs.